Cruelty-Free Webinars

How to do a webinar that DOESN'T Suck

Our Agenda:

• Choosing a Platform
• Setting Learning Goals
• Promotion & Outreach
• The Content
• Follow-Up

Choosing a Platform

Tools

• Meetcheap
• Readytalk
• GoToMeeting
• Adobe Connect

When picking a tool....

• know the participant experience
• make sure you can connect with your audience... international connectivity
• what is recording audio like? recording both? how can the recording be shared afterwards?
• what kind of bandwidth is needed?
• what is managing the audio like? (built-in audio or separate conference call line?)
• test with actual potential participants
• have a back-up plan

• know your deal breakers

• A review of different platforms
  • 9 Web Conferencing Platforms for Education and Collaboration 2.0 - What Should Your Organizations Use?

Setting learning Goals

• 2 to 3 Goals
• Clearly articulate assets / experience gain
• lower expectations - the webinar is a limited knowledge transfer platform
• know your participants - ask them questions - get them to set the learning goals

• you may always have target goals or metrics related to how many people attend... etc.

Promotion & Outreach

• Get webinar calendar established early
• a week from date, start sending daily emails, twitter, etc.
• two days from the webinar promote every few hours
• use registration but don't require it
• get nuggets out
• articulate learning goals

Prep

collaborating

• prep presenters with limited time frames
  • get them to rehearse
• have a back channel with other presenters during the webinar
• look for question plugin points though-out the webinar - instead of all at once at the end
• have a common platform you are creating presentations on, google docs presentation can help with this
• plan & practice, esp. transitions
• sound check at least 30 mins before
• upload content (slide deck) the night before

The Content

1. Tell 'em what you're going to tell 'em
2. Tell 'em
3. Tell 'em what you told 'em

• one nugget per slide, efficiently communicate, Takahashi method
  • create memorable visual metaphors
• make content personal
• warmth - use illustration - try hand written notes
• flow of training? meta then micro - theory then skill building

Follow-Up

• record & send to audience
  • transcribe or do a blog post & publish - reinforces content
• make slides available too
• Reach back out to participants
  • feedback? evaluation? "How can we improve the next webinar?"
  • more help
  • deeper dive into content